1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus such as a copier, a facsimile machine or a composite apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
In an image forming apparatus such as a copier, a facsimile machine or a composite apparatus, it has been conventionally known, in the case of an error such as a sheet jam, to display an occurrence of such an error on a display device arranged in an operation panel (see, for example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2005-208335). Further, in a known composite apparatus provided with a copier function, a facsimile function, a printer function and other functions, even if an error has occurred during a certain operation, there are cases where other operations can be executed. Thus, even if the operation error is not removed, the other operations not affected by the error are made executable. There have been also proposed image forming apparatuses that display other executable operations and operation statuses such as a job reception status on a display device.
In the above image forming apparatus according to prior art, an operator can confirm the other executable operations and already received jobs by displaying the above operation statuses on the display device in accordance with an instruction from the operator even during an operation error. However, in this case, the display of the operation error made on the operation panel is promptly switched to another display upon an instruction from the operator regardless of whether or not there is any occurrence of the operation error. Therefore, the operator may not be able to sufficiently recognize in which operation being executed in the image forming apparatus the error has occurred.